discussion comment
12 years ago
The small town nearest my farm has a population of 120. There is a crappy old hotel in the hamlet owned by bikers. A few times a year the bikers bring in a couple of peelers for the good ol' boys to ogle as they suck on their draft beer in the dingy tavern.
I haven't yet hit one of the peeler nights.
discussion comment
12 years ago
Sheesh, jack, you are the guy who packs a glock. All that I pack is an extra 30kgs of fat.
Never visited this club, it is new since my last Toronto trip but very very close to one of my favourite Toronto area clubs - Million Dollar.
discussion comment
12 years ago
Mama?.....What were you doing with me 63 years ago??
discussion comment
12 years ago
juice, you won't live another 50 years if you continue to eat all that fried fast food dreck that you claim to eat. Go to a doc once in a while for a physical. Quit the weed and other drugs if you really do that shit like you claim to do. That crap messes your brain, making you incapable of making rational investment decisions.
But, assuming that you might be a little bit serious, here is some advice from me - worth exactly what you are paying for it.
Gold, stamps, sports cards? Why? These things depend on always finding a 'greater fool' to buy them from you at a greater price than you paid. None of them have any intrinsic value.
Old coins? Again the 'greater fool' caveat with the single difference that coins maintain their face value.
CDs, bonds? Are you fucking nuts? At today's interest rates you are lucky if interest income after tax keeps up with even today's anemic inflation rates. There has been a 35 year bull market in bonds; that cannot continue. It is a pure mug's game to be buying bonds in this market. There is a zero possibility of capital gains in the bond market looking out 30 or 50 years from today's bond prices.
Copper, silver? These are industrial commodities but demand is so cyclical that they are not investment worthy for a 50 year time frame. Check silver prices in 1980 and calculate your return + inflation erosion if you are holding that same silver now, 30+ years later. If you have an infallible crystal ball you can invest in these commodities. But, I think that a guy who talks about sticking cucumbers in strippers' asses has no crystal ball to foretell the future. Even a mediocre crystal ball would tell you that cucumber move is a loser.
401k? Not an investment, just a tax planning vehicle.
Land? Unless you are talking about developed real estate with a rental income stream raw land is a risky proposition. Location, location, location, my man juice.
Life insurance? Do you have dependents? Do see the prospect of dependents in the future if you have none now? If answers to both questions are NO, then life insurance is of no use to you. It is just like setting fire to a pile of benjamins every month as you piss away all that premium money. I have not one single penny of life insurance.
Stocks? Go for it, juice. Can you read? Can you do simple arithmetic (addition, subtraction, multiplication, division)? Can you think independent of main stream cliches? Those are all the simple tools you need to be a successful stock market investor. The 'thinking' requirement is the most difficult to possess. All of my wealth apart that which is tied up in my oil and nat gas ventures is invested in common shares, trust units, and a very few pref shares. The majority is in Canada, small part is in USA, and I am just now venturing into equity investments in Europe (should have done that 18 months ago).
Mutual funds? These are for lazy dummies and morons. The MERs and all the other fees grind you down. Mutual funds exist to make money for the mutual fund companies and the mutual fund salespeople, An infinitely better investment is the common stock of the companies that peddle this mutual fund shit.
ETFs? A possibility but there are more ETFs than there are individual stocks so a learning curve is necessary. I am not prepared to venture out on that particular learning curve. Many ETFs are hopelessly complicated to understand.
There it is juice, farmerart's boring outpouring about investment instruments.
As I said earlier in this rant:
Worth exactly what you paid for it.
discussion comment
12 years ago
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rickduganVerified and Certifiable Super-Reviewer
I once had a tryst with a stripper in the sleeper of the Kenworth I happened to be driving the day of that SC visit. Not enough headroom for cow girl but plenty of headroom for missionary.
I suppose the bench seats in the crew cabs of the F-150s and F-350 that I drive might fit the bill. My old POS Olds Intrigue is definitely too cramped for a big guy like me to attempt the horizontal mambo.
discussion comment
12 years ago
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Papi_ChuloMiami, FL (or the nearest big-booty club)
Interesting topic, papi.
My answer to a) is.......61 years old!! Not a typo, really, I was 61.
My answer to b) is.......yes.....and NO. Yes, because I had no sex life at all before I was 37 years old and SCs could certainly have helped me with that irritation. But a resounding NO because of my addictive personality. Any thing that I do, I do to glorious excess. Work?....I am workaholic. Alcohol?.....I go on some monster binges with expensive wine and single malts involved. Food?.....During my retirement I gained 50kg indulging in my cooking hobby. Speed?.....I love hot, fast, sexy cars and I have a fascination with high speed which could be fatal if I am not careful. Do you see where I am going with this?
If I had discovered the delights of hardcore SCs when I was in my twenties I can easily see how I might have become addicted to those same delights. I would not have focused my energy on building my company. I would not have built my serious wealth. I would now be groveling for nickels and dimes in some crappy corner of the world.
For me, I do not wish I had entered this hobby any earlier than when I did.
discussion comment
12 years ago
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motorheadFat, drunk and stupid is no way to go through life
Spread manure and compost on my vegetable garden and flowerbeds? Breaking into my neighbour's pile of well rotted manure is a nasty job well worth that $20.
discussion comment
12 years ago
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Papi_ChuloMiami, FL (or the nearest big-booty club)
With all my world travel I have spent time in just four of these cities - London, Paris, Geneva, Monaco. London and Paris are fascinating cities but, for me, too big and noisy to be my residence. All the dog shit on Paris sidewalks is stomach-turning. Geneva is beautiful but sterile. Monaco is full of a loathsome breed of people called eurotrash; they make my skin crawl with revulsion.
For a few years I owned a small place 100km down the Cote d'Azur from Monaco in Saint-Raphael. That was a sweet place to spend winters. That area of France has long been the preferred playground of the super-rich, particularly the area around Cap d'Antibes. Go to Google and check out Villa Leopolda or Villa Ephrussi de Rothschild. Villa Leopolda is purported to be the world's most expensive house.
For me, I am happily content now with my big old house at Rancho farmerart in rural central Alberta. If I were to sell my quarter section of land complete with house and out buildings I would be lucky to get $500K-$600K. Put my house and 60 hectares of land (160 acres) on Cap d'Antibes; you would be looking at a value considerably over 1,000,000,000 - euros not dollars!
As we all know the real estate game is location, location, location.
discussion comment
12 years ago
I got lots of snow up here in NWT.....no girls..... but lots and lots of snow - cold, too.
Bring your girls to the camp, juice. There are 51 guys working in camp right now.....49 of them would be interested in girls (one cook and one camp attendant are gay).
discussion comment
12 years ago
Close to being a deal breaker for me but my sense of smell has been compromised by 45 years of oil patch crap up my nostrils. Even so I will shun a dancer whose smoke aura penetrates my defences.
discussion comment
12 years ago
The Toronto dancer who services me sweetly has done well economically from her game. She is older (42) and planning to open a business to support herself in her looming dotage. I have been invited to help finance this venture. My sweetie claimed to have saved $500K that she wants to put into her venture.
I didn't believe her claims of saving such an impressive sum and I have no intention of investing even a penny in her goofy proposal but while we were in Hawaii on vacation in January sweetie really pressed me for cash. She had a half-assed business plan and she showed me her investment and savings account statements. Be damned if she doesn't have that $500K in savings! It is in mutual funds and laddered 5 year GICs.
I gave her some solid advice about a better investment regime for her savings but she was having none of it. She is bound and determined on going ahead with her business idea.
Good luck to her is all that I can say.
discussion comment
12 years ago
Papi, all you need to know is that 350kph is fuckin' fast!
discussion comment
12 years ago
shadow, I didn't see your thread before I posted my own car topic. I am pretty sure that the car in my topic might get a bouncer to let the club know that a whale was entering the club.
Assuming, of course, that a SC bouncer would even recognize the red beasts that Ferrari produces.
discussion comment
12 years ago
@crazyjoe & zipman68,
Thanks for the inside info. There is a new Tilted Kilt in Edmonton and I often hear the spicy commercials on sports talk radio, very tempted to drop into the joint the next time that I am in Edmonton.
Looking forward to the extras for dessert.
discussion comment
12 years ago
Damn, motorhead, you read some pretty high-brow stuff.
I can only 'prey' to be able to understand that intellectual enlightenment.
discussion comment
12 years ago
Another thing I did during my retirement was ponder buying a club in Alberta. I got access to the audited books when I convinced the owner of my bona fides. I didn't like the return on investment indicated by the books and the price that the owner was asking. Not much chance of real estate delight; this joint was in a fading industrial area.
I strongly suspected skimming so I did some serious due diligence. I sat in that club every day for an entire week and watched operations as carefully as I could, trying to follow the cash. Day time operations were very straight forward. Decent lunch crowd, slow booze sales until about 6:00PM. Interesting things about this club: the change machine - stick in $20 bill get 20 loonies to throw at dancers on stage as tips and paying for private dances must be done ahead of time at the bar (bartender takes cash and makes written note of each dancer and number of dances she sells).
When cover charge applies at 7:00PM things got more interesting. Every day just before cover charge applies a flunky and bouncer come and gather cash from bartender and waitresses, empty change machine of $20 bills and restock with loonies, go to office with cash. During the evening they will restock the change machine if necessary and gather cash from door girl. Sunday through Thursday this routine was the same. Friday and Saturday were different - no flunky, the owner gathered the cash. No real surprise, the joint was much busier those two nights. BUT....I saw the owner pocket some of the cash from the change machine and bar every time he did his little run. Not all the cash made it into the satchel that went into the office.
During the week of my due diligence I estimated the business was 90% cash, 10% credit card (club didn't even accept debit). Booze sales were probably 75% beer (400% mark-up), varying mark-ups on liquor, wine, and soda (as high as 700% on some liquor). The most profitable drink sold in the joint, by far, was the soda. As a profit centre I considered food sales to be insignificant compared to the other cash sales. Cameras kept a watchful eye on bartenders and bouncers carefully recorded all booze brought out from storage to the bar as needed; didn't seem to be much employee booze 'shrinkage' to me.
I am 100% certain that the owner was doing some serious skimming. I really tried to get him to show me the 'real' books before the cash was recorded for the auditors and tax people. I didn't get anything but a sly grin from the guy.
And, of course, I didn't buy the club.
discussion comment
12 years ago
During my retirement I took a long look at RICK as a possible investment. I went over an annual report very diligently (2008 or 2009 annual - I forget which one).
When I read a balance sheet I am most influenced by the cash line. From my experience running my own business I know that all other things can be manipulated on a balance sheet. Cash is pure and visible for all to see. All other things flow from the cash.
Much more important for me when analyzing a company's annual are the footnotes. The RICK report had a flood of footnotes; cockroaches abounded in those footnotes, cockroaches that scared me.
#1 was a huge balloon debt payment due in the future (2013?...2015?..can't remember). My estimate was the cash line would have trouble supporting the interest demands of this new debt. RICK's only hope for new debt financing would be at 'junk' rates.
#2 was the Las Vegas operation. RICK had the curious ability to lose money operating a SC in Las Vegas! Duh? Las Vegas operation sucking cash from the rest of the corporation? Management....shake your heads!
#3 was a curious method of corporate financing that RICK had to 'fess up to in the footnotes. It was a curious scheme involving put options on its own stock! Betting on a fall in your own stock? That was a real red flag for me.
#4 was the real estate. RICK does not own all the real estate under their clubs. Not owning the real estate under three of the most profitable clubs worried me. Ownership of the real estate was not adequately explained for me. Another red flag. I got a hint of insider ownership of some of this real estate - didn't like that one bit.
#5 was the small float of stock and micro-cap nature of the company. I am not afraid of all micro-cap situations - I have made serious cash with investments in oil and gas micro-caps but in that field I have serious advantages over off-the-street investors. In RICK stock I would just be another sheep waiting to be fleeced.
I have not cast an analytical eye at RICK since then - no interest in the company at all. Are there any changes at RICK since I took a look at the company?
discussion comment
12 years ago
Nice fluffy topic, time for a hijack.
I often hit BBC and French TV for news. Mishal Husain, Karin Giannone, and Fiona Bruce on BBC are lap dance worthy for me as are Melissa Theuriau and Anne-Sophie Lapix on French TV. Anne-Sophie, in particular, would make me empty my wallet in the VIP.
discussion comment
12 years ago
$80K, juice?
Shit, that's peanuts. I wouldn't even get out of bed for $80K/year. A man of your obvious accomplishments is worth much more than that poverty pay.
discussion comment
12 years ago
I love the grape. Chateau Latour '45 is the best that I have ever sampled.
discussion comment
12 years ago
I saw Becky Meehan doing a 'streeter' when I was in London last summer.
She has smashing legs.
discussion comment
12 years ago
Does a night in the drunk tank count?
I spent one night in Calgary's drunk tank about 30 years ago. Appeared before a judge the following morning and was sentenced to 'time served'.
One of the prouder moments in my life.
discussion comment
12 years ago
What is 4chan?
What does it say about me that I know about Chaldeans but am completely clueless about 4chan?
I also know nothing about Jhonen Vasquez comics or Happy Noodle Boy. Do I really want to?
discussion comment
12 years ago
@motorhead,
Chaldeans?.....I have not encountered that word in years. My haphazard reading of ancient history led me to believe that the Chaldean Empire was located at the top of the Persian Gulf, sort of where Irag, Iran, and Kuwait come together, the marshes and deltas of the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers as it were.
Does my elderly memory agree what you found when you looked it up?
Talk of Chaldeans on tuscl?.......I can't believe it!!
discussion comment
12 years ago
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motorheadFat, drunk and stupid is no way to go through life
Good observations from motorhead and Dougster. Even though Canada and USA are very close linguistically and culturally, historically we are very very different. Looking from outside your borders I can see what you guys mean about being 'slow to social change'. You snap up economic and technological change with alacrity......political change much less readily.
My country goes through political upheavals regularly but is much less eager to adopt technological change. Economically we are a more conservative country than you but much more liberal socially.
Interesting evolution of this topic.
It just dawned on me...of all the thousands of books that I have read the bible is NOT among them.